Thranx

The Thranx are an insectoid species featured in Alan Dean Foster's Humanx Commonwealth book series. While at war with the reptilian AAnn, the Thranx discovered a human space vessel, and captured the occupants. Through the efforts of rogue thranx, the humans were liberated and returned to Terra, and the alliance between the two species was initiated.

Visually, the thranx are an insectoid race, about 1.5 meters long when on all six legs. They look roughly like very large praying mantises. Chitin color differs between males and females, being blue for the males and aquamarine for females, deepening to purple in old age. Thranx also possess vestigial double sets of wings, ritually removed after mating. The head is valentine-shaped, with large, compound golden eyes sometimes banded with red. They have four pairs of appendages; two truhands, four trulegs, and a set of intermediaries that can function as an additional pair of arms or legs. Like insects, they have no lungs and breathe through a series of openings at about waist level. Thranx are entirely unsuited to water and most fear it; they are not naturally bouyant and because they essentially breathe out of their waists, any water that reaches up to this level can drown them.

The species largely communicates with a complex language consisting of clicks and whistles. However, Thranx in their juvenile larval stage are able to take advantage of their flexible body structure to communicate with humans in verbal speech.

Their home planet is called Hivehom, the capital city of which is Daret. Willow-Wane is one of their major colony worlds. It is an Earth-like world with more humidity and a warmer climate (most areas are much like Terran rainforests), so that visiting humans wear minimal clothing. Human settlement on Hivehom tends to be restricted to the high plains as they possess a cooler, drier climate. Likewise, Thranx settlements on Terra thrive in the humid jungles of the Amazon basin.